Our good friends, Sky and Betsy, brought pizza and salad over last night and we had a really nice evening. We met several years ago, when Diane and I were asked to “mentor” a younger couple. We heard they were terrific and had the maturity to seek fellowship with, shall we say, a more seasoned couple, as they journeyed life’s paths. We’ve been incredibly close since then and the twenty or so years separating us in age matters little; the blessing is definitely a two way street. The four of us are open and honest and loving. That’s very cool. Last night, we caught up, laughed, hit some deep places in our lives, teared up on occasion, and closed with prayer that couldn’t have been more perfect. Makes me wonder …

How is this possible? We had a good life fifteen years ago, at least measured by normal metrics. In fact, some would argue we had a great life. What could we possibly be missing? Little did we know.

Speaking of wonder …

As I listened to God this morning … well, actually it was still night but I had awoken as usual so I call it morning … and sort of watched/heard the ticker tape of thoughts pass by, when somehow the pause button engaged on wonder. Not a surprise, really, because wonder is a big deal, at least for me.

We use the word, “wonderful,” often. Well, some of us do. As in, that was even better than nice. It was really good! “I had a wonderful time.” “What a wonderful ceremony.” As an adjective, it reflects a sense that the experience was especially fulfilling. Or, there’s another interpretation, as in I wonder what that might look like?  Sort of like, hmmmm, I think there’s another thing I should be considering.  But, is there something more going on?

Examined more closely or intimately, can we not take the word to mean, “Filled with Wonder?”

Put that way, the emphasis is not on the thing that occurred that we describe as wonderful. No, the emphasis is on us, as the receiver. It’s far more personal and sets a different bar for how we experience things outside of ourselves. The full part no longer hides at the end of the word, somehow making it sweet but not allowing us to appreciate the potential impact.

Really? Filled with wonder? What’s that? And, how does that relate to my life and whatever circumstances I find myself in?  Like now.

I hope you are joining with me as we reflect on what wonder is, how it arrives, how it affects us and what it’s like to be filled with it.

I think I touched on this a few days ago. It’s hard to talk about joy or love or grace or awe without bumping into wonder. But, I’ve found that by reflecting more deeply on the true meaning of each of these things, the distinctions (although maybe small on the surface) help me appreciate and live into each of these dimensions more fully.

I can remember wondering a great deal as a child and young man. I guess that was part of my strong inquisitive nature. Always asking questions, analyzing, trying to consider possibilities.  I think, also, appreciating the beauty in the natural world. As I matured, these senses became more developed and helped me as a teacher and educational leader, husband and father and just as an individual on life’s journey.

But, it’s largely been in the last ten years or so, that (like joy) the sense of wonder has blossomed considerably. More and more frequently, I find myself “filled with wonder.”

What does that mean?

I guess I take that to mean, first, that we are immediately struck by how small we are in the face of this thing but, paradoxically, how incredibly connected we are to its essence.  As in, I shake my head to try to comprehend the depth of what I’m seeing/hearing/experiencing because this thing isn’t a little thing. It has at least momentarily stopped me in my tracks and that’s really good.

Second, this thing has meaning for me. It speaks to me, makes life better, fuller, more worth living. And, this meaning resonates and breaks through whatever troubles or anxieties we have and shows us beauty.

Now, beauty is a loaded word. In this case, however, I take it to mean something that draws us more deeply into the core of who we are and how we are designed.

In Genesis 1:26 (and elsewhere) we are informed we are created in the image of God. Set aside how we read scripture, especially the creation story in the world’s three great monotheistic traditions. Put simply, either there is a personal God who is behind and present in all of this or there is not. And, if there is, is it realistic to think that he would “create us in his image?” And, what could that possibly mean, if that’s realistic?  And, set aside for the moment all of the reasons we don’t behave in a way that reflects his character. (That’s a worthy topic for discussion but not for now.)

Part of what’s left is that we are hard wired to appreciate the majestic. The beauty that surrounds us. The intricate ways we are tuned and connected to the vibrant things in life.  And, that this can happen even when things are dreary. I treat these moments now as remarkable gifts and wait in anticipation to see how they will arrive.

When I was maybe 23 and facing some personal struggles, including the loss of a loved one, the rather nasty divorce of my parents, and the realization that my long-planned career in the law no longer held appeal, I met a guy named John. He was a nuclear physicist and he and his family sort of adopted me. One night, he posed a simple question to me that I’ve never forgotten. In fact it helped me break through into a new way of being filled with wonder. He just said, “If I gathered a cubic centimeter of water molecules together, like in an unbelievably tiny imaginary cube, and poured them out on this table in a little pile … and then strung them end to end like in a string of beads, how long would the string be?” I have posed this same question to many people since then, including teaching it to chemistry classes when I was a principal. They always answered it as I did. Which was anything from a few feet to a little longer, or to several who really reached and said something like around the earth. In fact, that little string of water molecules, touching end to end would stretch from the sun past Pluto which was the half way point. About 9.4 billion miles. And, the math of it is actually quite simple.

Now, take about stopping me in my tracks. For years, and sometimes even now, as I drive on the freeway and look at the dashed dividing lines quickly zip by, I’ve thought about that string of molecular beads on the road’s surface and pondered, how amazing that is. How filled with wonder I am at this beautiful reality: Things infinitesimally small are part of something unimaginable vast! And, I’m made up of and part of the whole thing.

One of the greatest living scientists is a man named Francis Collins. The guy is really bright. He has a Ph.D and an M.D. He was the head of the Genome Project which was a watershed moment in the understanding of the fundamental building blocks of our life. Mapping the human genome was a very big deal. And, now he is the head of NIH: The National Institute of Health. In other words, he gets science and its relationship to who we are. He wrote a book called The Language of God which is simply astonishing in its beauty, depth and simplicity. If anyone wants to resolve the ongoing tug of war between science and faith, this is a great place to go.  In a companion book entitled The Language of Science and Faith, among many, many topics, he talks about the fine tuning of the universe. (Google it, too.) I marvel at its reality. I’m filled with wonder by a little blurb that goes like this:

Another initial condition in the finely tuned universe model was the density of the universe. In order to develop in a life-sustaining manner, the universe must have maintained an extremely precise overall density. The precision of this density must have been so great that a change of 0.0000000000001 percent would have resulted in a collapse, or a big crunch, occurring far too early for life to have developed, or there would have been an expansion so rapid that no starts, galaxies or life would have been formed. This degree of precision would be like a blindfolded person chasing a single lucky penny in a pile large enough to pay off the United States’ national debt.

Or this one,

Consider the ratio of the masses for protons and electrons. The mass of a proton is 1836.1526 times the mass of an electron. Were this ratio changed, the stability of many common chemicals would be compromised. In the end, this would prevent the formation of such molecules as DNA, the building blocks of life.

I reflect on two things. The first is that, regardless of what we think about ultimate origins and the existence of a creator God, this kind of stuff is mind-boggling and has to fill us with wonder. What an amazing and awesome place this all is! And, I’m just an almost infinitely small speck in there somewhere.

To paraphrase Humphrey Bogart in Casablanca: Our problems don’t amount to a hill of beans in this crazy world. Or, our little lives can’t begin to match up in significance with the reality contained in the examples above.

Which brings me to the second thing.

In fact, our lives completely match up with those examples and we do have ultimate meaning. The beauty and immensity of the natural reality is actually manifest in our own being and we are firmly connected in a way that fills us with wonder.

It should come as no surprise that Dr. Collins, eminent scientist who grew up with no faith, was an atheist as a gifted young student and physician, finally was left with no alternative but to recognize God’s reality. And, ultimately, like me, who grew up with no faith, struggled through decades of trying to make sense of everything, came to recognize God’s reality. And, like Dr. Collins, that reality further settled on Jesus as God incarnate. Talk about wonder! I understand that some who are reading these reflections get turned off by the name or concept of Jesus and I respect your beliefs. But, I hope we can all break through a lot of that and reflect on whether these things being discussed ring at all true. Also, thank you for your willingness to participate in Diane’s and my life.

As this reflection begins to conclude, a sense of wonder does not always have to be about big, grand, show-stopping moments of clarity. What about the every day stuff?

I’ve come to believe that wonder is a state of being. It’s never that far below the surface. Like love, where we rest in the knowledge that we are loved and love others, although those things don’t occupy our every thought, wonder is ready for the picking. It’s just right there, within reach if we only knew how to be available to it, to grab ahold, to be in a place to take it in.

I’ve learned that I can’t do that when I’m consumed with tasks or accomplishing things or when my mind races like it wants to do all of the time. I’ve learned that I need to slow the world down considerably. There are many cliches that say this but that doesn’t mean they’re not true. As nearly every faith tradition teaches, we should devote time and energy to letting go and appreciating. In doing so, Wonder can’t help but break out and fill us.

The psalmist says, “The heavens declare the glory of God; the skies proclaim the work of his hands.” Psalm 19:1

Lord, thank you for giving us the gift of wonder. Help us to remove the scales from our eyes that block the beauty. Equip us with the means to see things both small and vast that touch our souls and let us know we are significant, even as we face tremendous challenges. What a grounds for rejoicing!